New smartphone suffers from chronic power issues.. Theoretically, USB-charged phones are capable of negotiating the highest amount of power to charge when the charger is smart enough to ask. Such a charger could exceed the lousy 500 mA USB spec.

The question is, how do I go about finding one? In shopping around, there are some microUSB chargers that claim to be "rapid chargers", or "smart chargers", but this could just be misleading marketing because they never seem to give details stating why it is supposedly fast. Any EE experts know a specific no-B.S. model they can recommend? Or perhaps the right keyword to search on to find these chargers?

pulse charging:I would also be interested in finding an even more aggressive charger - one that uses pulse charging. I assume this wouldn't work over USB, so it would be something that could be connected to a naked 3.7v li-ion battery, and then do the kind of smart charging we get from a good La Cross charger (which would cyclically max out the power, followed by a small discharge to control temperature/pressure, in quick succession).

(BTW- I'm not interested in conserving battery power.. I need GSM and wifi to run constantly)

Is this for car or AC/DC brick? You just need to find anything that provides 1A or more of output. The "smart" part mostly comes from the phone, not the adapter. Phone will pull as much as it can/thinks it needs.

Pulse charging would not do anything in your case, the battery charging controller is inside the phone, all that you would have happen is the charging start and stop.

gargam3l

Member

posted: Nov. 13, 2011 @ 4:39a

RushnRockt said: Is this for car or AC/DC brick? You just need to find anything that provides 1A or more of output. The "smart" part mostly comes from the phone, not the adapter. Phone will pull as much as it can/thinks it needs.I've read that USB charging has smarts at both sides. Because phones can accept a range of voltages, the PSU can be told what voltage to send (which is communicated over USBs data lines). From there the current is regulated by the phone.

I think what you're talking about refers to pre-USB charging days, when mobile phones were charged by barrel connectors. What I'm not sure about is whether each phone is still limited to a single voltage, and the communication is simply to tell a universal PSU which voltage it takes -- or if a single phone can accept a range of voltages, and it asks for the optimum one based on the consumption.

*edit* The max voltage range that USB chargers can have seems to be 4.75V to 5.25V. Seems small enough to neglect.

As for whether I need a car charger or wall socket, doesn't matter. It's ultimately for a wall socket, but I also have the AC to 12v car socket adapter. The included PSU is strictly 5V 1A, and I believe what I want is something that can exceed 5V and supply 2A at the highest voltage.

RushnRockt said: Pulse charging would not do anything in your case, the battery charging controller is inside the phone, all that you would have happen is the charging start and stop.

For the pulse charger, I said I was looking for something that would connect to the naked battery, so the phone is out of the picture. This would be a different charger, separate from the above mentioned microUSB one. I'm looking for this because (I believe) the phones charging controller limits the phone to trickle charging, and I want something that outperforms the trickle charge.

RushnRockt

Senior Member - 4K

posted: Nov. 13, 2011 @ 11:01a

gargam3l said: I've read that USB charging has smarts at both sides. Because phones can accept a range of voltages, the PSU can be told what voltage to send (which is communicated over USBs data lines). From there the current is regulated by the phone.

That's not true for just about any of the phone "chargers" you'll see out there. They are for the most part just voltage converters with current limited. There are no smart.

gargam3l said: I think what you're talking about refers to pre-USB charging days, when mobile phones were charged by barrel connectors.

Nope, still true today for just about any of them.

gargam3l said: What I'm not sure about is whether each phone is still limited to a single voltage, and the communication is simply to tell a universal PSU which voltage it takes -- or if a single phone can accept a range of voltages, and it asks for the optimum one based on the consumption.

If a phone is setup for USB charging, it means that the battery charging IC inside takes the USB spec voltage of 5V +/-10% and then converts to the necessary voltage at the necessary current level. It is all done internally to the phone.

gargam3l said: As for whether I need a car charger or wall socket, doesn't matter. It's ultimately for a wall socket, but I also have the AC to 12v car socket adapter. The included PSU is strictly 5V 1A, and I believe what I want is something that can exceed 5V and supply 2A at the highest voltage.That would mean the phone would also have to be able to take 2A. See specs for the phone, if it only takes 1A max, you have a 100A converter and that will do nothing for your purposes.

gargam3l said: For the pulse charger, I said I was looking for something that would connect to the naked battery, so the phone is out of the picture. This would be a different charger, separate from the above mentioned microUSB one.Missed that part.

gargam3l said: I'm looking for this because (I believe) the phones charging controller limits the phone to trickle charging, and I want something that outperforms the trickle charge.

That is incorrect. Battery charging controllers do not limit phones to trickle charging. If that was true, you'd spend at least 10 hours trying to charge the battery. Typical trickle charge is 0.1C, where C is battery capacity/hour. Charging phone batteries at higher than 1C is not recommended, so the charger you are talking about won't be solving any issues and is not a good solution for the battery anyway.

One of the things that might be limiting your charging is the temperature of the phone. If it heats up while working and heats up the battery compartment enough, charging controller will start limiting the current. Sometimes that can be caused by something as simple as the phone laying on a non-heatconductive surface.

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